How School Social Workers Help Students Succeed

Introduction

The problem of interest to this study concerns the various reasons students need assistance from social workers, which typically include a lack of financial or academic resources and/or a lack of a family support system at home. Children enrolled in school today face not only the full range of challenges long associated with an early academic career (Dealey, 2017), but also a life-threatening global pandemic that has them and their parents validly concerned about their safety (London, 2020). Moreover, the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has significantly disrupted normal school attendance across the country — in some cases for lengthy periods — and these young learners will be forced to catch up with their unaffected peers for the foreseeable future when and if they are able to return to a normal classroom environment. The prevalence of post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental health disorders is also expected to increase among people of all ages, meaning young people face a compounding set of challenges to their education.

It is also reasonable to posit that traditional family support systems have been severely disrupted in recent months, especially for children forced to attend virtual school. While the advantages of online learning for adults are well documented, young people may not possess the self-discipline or attention span needed to endure hours-long virtual classes and still manage to learn effectively. This means that school social workers have an important role to play by ensuring they fully understand the adverse effects the ongoing pandemic has had on their school communities, the readiness of students to engage in virtual learning, and what resources are available for this purpose. As the editors of the School Social Work Journal emphasize, "School social workers must possess a deep understanding of an extensive set of current societal conditions, student characteristics, and technology" (Visiting teachers to superheroes, 2018, p. 9). This is an especially important point because many American families are faced with increasingly severe economic problems due to pandemic-caused unemployment and lack the financial resources needed to provide their children with Internet-enabled computers.

Against this backdrop, the role of the nation's approximately 600,000 school social workers has clearly assumed new importance and relevance for young people and their families (Careers in social work, 2020). These issues are examined further below, guided by the following research question: "Do school social workers help students overcome obstacles that impede social and academic success when the student participates in services provided or recommended by the school social worker?" The independent variables that guided the research strategy were the services provided by the school social worker; the dependent variable was the student's willingness to participate in those services.

With school budgets already stretched razor-thin, it is not surprising that staff positions that may appear superfluous to students' needs at any given point in time come under increased scrutiny, and this has been the case with school social workers in recent years. In some instances, school social workers have been forced to justify their contributions in order to continue practicing (Finigan-Carr & Shaia, 2018). According to Altshuler and Webb (2009), "School social workers often face challenges of having to legitimize their presence as a school professional, especially as compared to school psychologists and school counselors" (p. 207). Moreover, school social workers are susceptible to being singled out by other school personnel as being unnecessary — effectively regarded as "added baggage" in the educational resource mix (Altshuler & Webb, 2009). Their study was particularly timely because it identified and described the multiple obstacles that school social workers have faced and their respective sources.

Literature Review

Today, these issues are even more pressing because many American families are experiencing greater discord than in years past, and the prevalence of domestic violence and child abuse has increased since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. Given these trends, it is reasonable to conclude that divorce rates will also rise from their already high levels, further undermining the healthy dynamics of a growing number of American families. According to Huffman's (2013) pre-pandemic assessment of American schoolchildren: "Rising rates of divorce, cohabitation and children being born to unwed parents have caused many children to enter the public school system with less parental stability and support" (p. 37). As recently as 2014, nearly half of all marriages in the U.S. ended in divorce (Divorce statistics and facts, 2020), and it is reasonable to suggest that these trends have continued or accelerated in the years since.

These are important trends for social workers in schools where many — if not most — students live in single-parent homes. A growing body of research confirms that young people living in single-parent homes are at a greater disadvantage for a number of reasons, most notably lower socioeconomic status and reduced access to parental support for schoolwork at home (Huffman, 2013). School social workers are particularly well situated to help these students navigate such problems; ongoing support and individualized interventions can help improve academic performance as well as reduce discipline problems and absenteeism (Huffman, 2013), all of which contribute to improved academic success.

School social workers also assist students in numerous other ways, including the administration of specialized skills training and counseling for individuals, groups, and families (Allen-Meares, Montgomery & Kim, 2013). In addition, social workers in schools help young learners by providing home visitations when appropriate, developing efficacious interventions, serving as advocates for children and their families, and providing crisis interventions when needed (Allen-Meares, Montgomery & Kim, 2013). These crisis interventions exist along a continuum ranging from Tier 1 (universal, school-wide) to Tier 3 (intensive, individualized treatment). The vast majority of young learners — between 95% and 99% — can have their treatment needs met using Tier 1 interventions delivered in classroom settings, but some students require Tier 2 or Tier 3 interventions specifically targeted at individual problems (Allen-Meares et al., 2013). This research provides evidence-based guidance that can be applied in virtually any primary educational setting.

Another critical way that school social workers help young learners is through dropout prevention initiatives (Randle, 2016). Students may face any number of problems that prevent them from actively participating in their education, and some of these problems may be so severe that they compel students to leave school entirely. A qualitative study by Webber (2018) drew on interviews with school administrators, counselors, and social workers to identify the main strategies used for dropout prevention:

Succeeding in encouraging young people to remain in school represents a major way that school social workers help these students achieve their full academic and personal potential. Although the study by Webber (2018) was limited by the relatively small number of interviewees, the empirical observations offer useful guidance from the field that might not be obtainable through other means.

While most school social workers may not serve in all of the capacities identified above, it is clear that the profession is far more important and valuable — especially today — than some members of the school system might otherwise believe (Altshuler & Webb, 2009). In sum, this study's guiding research question builds upon the existing body of knowledge concerning the various ways school social workers help students, and expands upon it by examining specific constraints that limit students' academic success along with evidence-based ways that school social workers can intervene. There remains a paucity of timely and relevant research concerning the dependent variable of interest — students' willingness to participate in services provided by the school social worker — making the need for a robust research method all the more important.

Research Methods

Social science researchers have a wide range of qualitative and quantitative methods available, each with its own benefits and limitations. Based on a review of the most appropriate approaches, a mixed-methods research strategy combining qualitative and quantitative elements was regarded as optimal. This selection is consistent with the guidance provided by Neuman (2008), who advises that a mixed-methods approach using a custom questionnaire integrating both qualitative and quantitative data can yield more robust findings than the use of either strategy alone. The sample and custom survey instrument for this study are described in the sections below.